Truth Lies in Reality
by Desenchanter
Summary: He taught her three vital lessons as her grasp slipped away, the importance of the truth, the power of a lie, and the misery reality is always stained in. Twisted-Canon. One-shot.


_**A/N**_: Written for inuyasha_et_al (community . livejournal . com /inuyasha_et_al), **prompt dream**.  
**Warnings**: sexual situations  
_**Please review.**_ This may be a three-part series or it might just be a stand-alone. I don't know yet.

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**{.T**_ruth_** L**_ies _in **R**_eality_**.}**  
**{.****T**ruth**.}**

[...]

A nice smile.

That was her aim and the perfect prize—it could make up for everything else that was lacking. The scoffs, growls, bickering, and absent affection was all fine, it was well worth it once that appeared.

His smile.

It was all she remembered of him, the _real_ him, any longer. On the rare occasions he let one slip she knew how he really felt, that she _mattered_ to him. When one flashed out for the flickering, fleeting moments that never lasted long enough, she could see his warmth that he tried so hard to hide along with that sweeter side he swore did not exist. He was hurt one too many times in ways she never knew.

She had a family, one that loved her dear.

She had a home, whole and warm just waiting for her to return.

She had a love, a man that cherished her in a way only he could.

She had friends, so many that she couldn't understand the loneliness he had once felt for so long.

Her life was filled with so much that he never knew, that was why she was the light of the group. She had what they all had lost.

And the dimwitted damsel didn't notice it or appreciate it like she should.

No, not until it was all gone in a bloody blur. Then she learned the truth, how she didn't know what she had until it was gone. So much poured out of them—_more than just blood and tears_—that would forever scorn her mind in the final moments before what should have been the end… hers, too.

But no, she lived on. For her family, she had to. Even if she knew misery would always be in her company she did not want to give up on life without a fight, even if she had hoped to live for was gone in more ways than one.

Reality was crueler than she ever thought possible, with the shikon no tama's vanquished the well ceased to work. No matter how many times she leaped down it, no matter how much she cried out or clawed at the dirt to the point of broken nails it would not budge.

Days dawned into night, nights fell into days and all shifted into seasons.

There was no change.

She was stuck in a world that was not her own, in a life that she should not have had to endure, and all alone.

It was only then she began to feel his pain, when it was too late to mend their ties…

_Comatose hazels stared out into the empty sky, void of the bold beam that once held itself high, just like her._

The first time he appeared she knew it wasn't real but she felt nothing all the same—no fear, no pain, no warmth—just like she had for so very long. It was easier to feel nothing than everything.

It was a trick of some sort, either by another or her own mind but she didn't care. She'd fall for it time and time again, knowing all the well her mind's grasp was slipping away into the dream world the red robed devil brought with him at each encounter.

He looked so real, so right. Long silver tresses, a sunlit stare, and the smile she had always yearned to see more of. He felt so genuine, so grand. Every time he touched her, whenever his thumb caressed her cheek or lips locked with hers—_in a way she never had with the true version_.

Talk was never spared, there was no need. The artificial artwork before her knew she did not believe, once or twice she had caught the baffle in his gaze whenever she gave in and she knew it wasn't really him. That he was gone and all she could do was wait to meet him in another life.

She could waste time worrying, wondering what had become of her sanity and if that was the teasing creature responsible for the visits or if it was another but she never did.

_There wasn't enough her left to care._

Eventually, she gave into the enchanting fantasy in a way she never did the other—_her real love_? Under the grand tree that meant so much to a girl that felt so little, she let her clothes drop and watched as he did the same. Each inch feeding the fiction on that cloudy day.

And he'd smile, that smile she wanted, for that she gave him everything. In a tangled, sweaty, mess they merged. There was a rush of blood to bring life to two bodies that had been without it for so long. A little bit of pain pierced through her with the first thrusts, to remind her she was still very much _alive. _

Lips slipped up and down her—_neck, breasts, stomach, below…_

But never to hers, they weren't lovers. Lovers loved but a fuck was what it was—a good time.

With each thrust came a building strain of something so sweet, so good, that it made the vacancy within wither away and the miser subside if only for a moment. Her body arched to meet the stranger's that seemed so familiar as her lips parted to let out a silent cry.

_He became her next mistake._

Once every blue moon, that was how often he'd show up and if there was a slim light, full circle, or nothing at all in the night sky he'd always appear the same. That was another reason she knew it wasn't him…

That and the last time she saw him he was coated in blood, so much that it made her sick still to think of it.

But after their first frisk encounter he—_it?_—started to show up regularly, once a month turned into once a week which morphed into once every other night and still she never cared to ask, it was he who broke the silence.

The voice was just right, it ached in a way she no longer thought it did.

"Why?"

Such a simple word that carried so much weight—why did she let a stranger taint her over and over again?

The old her would object but that part had long ago faded away with the decaying bodies that accompanied her old life.

So her answer was a mere shrug, because there were no words to answer that. She had no clue.

That time it—_he?_—slipped up, his lips brushed against hers while their bodies banged together. She froze as he continued—hands up her thigh, pushing her legs further apart as he deepened his thrust. He didn't seem to mind her lack of participation through the rest.

Her mind had left from that one mishap to a world she never met it to go to.

_What if it was the real Inuyasha instead of the poor replacement?_

And her mind replied before her heart had a chance to stop it—she'd be a mangled mess just like the rest.

It was her arrow that freed the shikon no tama from Naraku's body, it was her who put the jewel back together again, but it was him that made the wish to become what he had wanted from the start. As she feared, all was lost. The kind hearted man she loved vanished forever in that moment, she watched as he tore down friend after friend then he came to her.

The one left untouched.

_Yet scared in a way that would never disappear._

Something happened, someone stopped him, with his death and the seal of the well came the end of her…

"Why?" He repeated as they put their clothes back on.

"Why?" she countered, why did he do this? Wasn't that just as good as questioning her motives?

Their eyes met for a moment and one word answered it all, "punishment."

What was she to be punished for? What had she done that was so wrong? Was her souls simply damned from the start?

"Oh," she whispered, as if that made everything clear.

_She had long accepted the cruelty reality brought about…_

Then he came during the day, they met under the same tree but this time there was light flickering through the leaves green with fresh life.

If only she could see the beauty in it.

"Are you curious?" He asked.

She just tilted her head to the side and let her hallow hazels wash over him once more before he morphed into the monster she should have expected but didn't.

Shock shook her first as she straightened up and let her eyes grow wide…

That sick smirk he wore so well appeared, "you did not kill me."

Obviously, in less this too was a trick her mind was playing on her. After all that had happened—time and time again spent seeking the spider to squash it—and now she had given him…?

But what had _he_ done to _her_? Was it selfish to wonder that?

He had taken all from Sango, cursed Miroku, killed Kikyou, and tortured Inuyasha but her...? He had never really harmed her. Not first hand, at least.

"Why?" She questioned again, in an oddly calm hum.

"You took the jewel from me," he snarled.

She shook her head, he misunderstood, "why stop him?"

A brow lifted as his red eyes turned from anger to puzzlement, and then it dawned on him.

That day, when her hanyou love became a monster he had been the one to stop him from taking her life.

Why?

He'd never tell her that he was sick of being alone.

_ To taint her was better than having nothing._

She'd never tell him what she really meant.

_Why did he give her the smiles she would die to see?_


End file.
